Sommersgate House (32 page)

She stood
there and stared at him as he fell back on her bed and closed his
eyes.

And she
couldn’t help but wonder, what exactly
had
he seen? What on earth could make Douglas Ashton’s
renowned composure slip?

Pulling
herself from her thoughts, Julia went around turning off the lights
and making up her mind (or making up excuses, depending on how you
looked at it).

It
wouldn’t hurt, just tonight; he’d had a painkiller which
eventually
should kick in.

And he’d been
shot, for goodness sake.

And he needed
human companionship and gone so far as to admit it. She couldn’t
say no as she knew exactly how that felt.

She decided
tomorrow she could go back to being aloof and unaffected by
him.

Tonight, she
was going to give Douglas what he wanted.

Just this
once.

She climbed
into bed cautiously and no sooner had she begun to lay back, his
arm shot out and pulled her closer.

Then he
hissed, “Bloody hell, your hands are like ice.”

Hastily she
explained, “I was in the chapel, I didn’t want to children to hear
me pacing. It was cold.”

“Get under the
covers,” he ordered and she jumped out of bed as he rolled off the
other side. He carefully took off his boots as she ran to put on a
pair of socks so her feet wouldn’t freeze him, returned and got
under the covers where he already was.

Just as
before, the minute she lay her body down, he pulled it towards him.
The way they were laying she had no choice but to rest one hand on
his chest and her cheek on his good shoulder. She felt his muscles
tense at the coldness of her hands but he said nothing.

She felt like
a fool.

“I’m sorry my
hands are cold,” she whispered.

He made a
noise that sounded a lot like a grunt.

Then,
silence.

She tried to
relax and couldn’t.

So she asked,
“Where’s Nick?”

Another grunt
and no further reply so she assumed Nick wasn’t coming back.

She waited
another moment.

“
Who
is
Nick, by the
way?” she inquired, not able to stop herself.

“Julia, if you
don’t shut up, I’ll be forced to shut you up and although I have a
feeling we both would very much enjoy what I have in mind, it might
cause me to bleed to death. So, I’m asking you please, just be
quiet and go to sleep.”

“Okay,” she
relented, too terrified to say anything else.

“And don’t be
scared of me,” he demanded in that tone that again said he expected
her to obey even though his demand was impossibly ridiculous.

“Okay,” she
repeated meekly, trying to get him to relax as she could tell by
the muscles flexing under her hands that he wasn’t. “Goodnight. I’m
glad you’re okay,” she whispered.

At that, he
pulled her closer.

And, much
sooner than she ever expected, she fell into a dreamless sleep.

Fire and
Ice

Douglas awoke
in an empty bed, moving his head to the side to see Julia was gone.
He looked at the clock and it was seven forty-five. The children
would have left for school and he was wondering where the hell she
was when he heard the shower.

He felt his
body involuntarily relax.

The painkiller
hadn’t started working until after Julia had fallen asleep. He
could tell when she finally dropped off and the tenseness went out
of her body, the weight of her settling against his side.

He very much
enjoyed that feeling.

He awoke
sometime in the night to feel that Julia had settled in quite well.
The freezing cold hand she’d laid tentatively on his chest was now
a warm arm that draped across his abdomen. Her face was snuggled
deeper into his shoulder and she’d crooked her leg, the knee
settled just under his groin, her calf falling between his legs.
Her body was remarkably warm in sleep and he found her heat
strangely comforting.

Hearing the
shower stop, he tested his shoulder cautiously and winced at the
pain. He should get up and leave but none of the staff knew he was
home and he didn’t relish exiting Julia’s room first thing in the
morning, bare-chested and wrapped in bandages.

She strode
into the room wearing her long, lilac cashmere robe and wrapped
around her hair was a towel that had obviously been confiscated
from another bathroom. Douglas’s mother was particular about the
colour coordination of towels and Julia had used all of hers on him
last night.

She walked
straight to the desk, the front of the robe parting to accommodate
her stride showing a shapely length of leg. She hadn’t noticed he
was awake so he took advantage of this opportunity to observe
her.

Douglas
watched as she stood by the desk and reached down. He could tell by
her movements that she was using the touchpad on her laptop and was
clicking through something. She stopped, leaned over the screen to
have a better look and smiled softly. He felt his chest tighten at
the smile, an instantaneous reaction the cause of which he felt it
best to ignore.

One of the
many reactions he’d been having to Julia lately that he felt it
best to ignore.

She sat down
to give whatever it was her attention, crossing her legs to the
side of the desk and the robe fell away, exposing them fully to his
gaze. Her fingers flew over the keyboard with astonishing speed but
before she was finished the handle on the door rattled. He watched
her head shoot up then she exited the chair and flew across the
room.

She caught the
door as it was opening and whispered, “Ronnie…”

Douglas heard
his maid murmuring and Julia responded quietly, “I got up a little
late… didn’t get a shower before breakfast. I’m sorry, can you come
back later? I’ll find you, okay?”

He heard the
affirmative noise from Veronika, Julia closed the door and turned
toward the bed. He saw her head peeping around the draperies and
closed his eyes, feigning sleep. When he heard her move off, he
opened them again.

He watched her
stroll down the hall of her dressing room. She sorted through some
drawers and he saw her pull out a wisp of white.

This was when
any chivalrous man would either close his eyes or let her know he
was awake.

Douglas,
however, was not the kind of man to let chivalry stand in the way
of seizing an opportunity.

She bent down
to step into her underwear, her back to him, the robe hiding
anything but a brief flash of leg, which, Douglas thought, was
damned disappointing.

At that point,
he found himself tiring of the game and wanting her attention
instead. He rolled cautiously out of bed, walked silently across
the room and stood in the doorway to her dressing room, leaning his
good shoulder against the door jam.

“Good morning,
Julia.”

She let out a
small, stifled scream and whirled around, her hand flying to the
opening of her robe.

“You’re
awake,” she noted the obvious.

He crossed his
arms on his chest and winced. She noticed his grimace and came
forward.

“How are you
feeling?” she asked gently, her eyes were on his bandages.

How
was
he
feeling?

That was an
excellent question.

His shoulder
was burning with pain but that he could handle.

His feelings
about last night were quite a bit different.

She’d been
extraordinary. Throughout her performance he didn’t know whether to
order Nick from the room and throw her on the bed or strangle
her.

In his life,
only one woman had ever even attempted to care for him and that
woman was his sister. His mother had never bothered. He’d never had
another woman who cared for anything other than his money, his
title, the enjoyment he could give them in bed or the number of
photographs she could appear in at his side.

While they
were growing up, Tamsin had been just like an angry lioness
protecting her cub, albeit she was a powerless one.

Last night, he
watched Julia do the same, but she wasn’t powerless. She was
dazzling and formidable, bent on controlling the situation and
looking after him, even when she had no idea what she was doing and
even when he ordered her not to.

Her behaviour
only served to strengthen his resolve to have her as his wife.
Outside of that, he wouldn’t allow himself to contemplate.

“It hurts like
hell,” he answered her question.

He watched
with no small amount of fascination as her eyes melted and she
closed the space between them.

“I’m sorry,”
she said, her voice low and gentle.

“I’ll
survive,” he told her, his tone just as soft.

She looked in
his eyes and hers became startled as realisation dawned that they
were sharing a tender moment. Douglas watched, registering a vague
sense of disappointment when the guard went up and Julia carefully
controlled her features.

“Well, never
fear,” she stated airily, the moment lost, she was moving back into
the dressing room and waving her arm for emphasis, “Carter had a
quiet little chat with me this morning and apparently your friend
Nick called him. You have a doctor’s appointment today at nine.
Carter is going to bring some clothes down for you and he’ll be
taking you.”

She stopped
abruptly and turned around slowly, the melting look in her eyes now
long gone. She glanced around the room, down at herself and then up
at him.

“You seem
bright-eyed this morning,” she commented warily.

“I’ve been
awake for ten minutes.” He watched her eyes widen in angry
amazement. “Maybe fifteen,” he allowed.

She stood
there a moment, shocked speechless and then she smiled.

“You cad!” she
cried, her voice filled with humour.

Her unusual
word choice almost made him smile.

“Cad?” he
asked.

“Yes, ‘cad’,”
she replied. “I’m practising not cursing. I don’t want to pass any
foul words to the children.”

She pulled the
towel off her head and whipped her hair around while she grabbed
her comb. He found her reaction to his spying on her while she put
on her underwear bizarre in the extreme.

“You aren’t
angry.” It was a statement, rather than a question and she turned
to him.

Then she
looked in the mirror as she pulled the comb firmly through her
hair.

“Oh, yes,
Douglas Ashton, I’m angry. Although I find I can’t make room to be
even angrier at you now that you’ve taken the liberty to spy on me
while I put on panties. I’m already angry enough that, when you
arrived home last night, not only had you been shot but your
companion was pointing a gun at me.” Julia’s eyes moved from her
reflection to Douglas. “Not that I would mind nocturnal visits from
gunshot victims or having firearms mistakenly levelled at me in
dark hallways…” she paused, straightened and skewered him with a
look, “if I lived in some war-torn, third-world country and you
were a rebel fighting for our freedom against the nasty
federales!”

She took
a breath and continued staring at him. He was having some
difficulty dealing with the intimate sensation he felt whenever he
heard her say the word “home”. Not to mention trying to keep his
face straight at her dramatic tirade.

When he made
no response, she went on.

“So, I hope
you’ll allow me to vent my anger at today’s antics some other
time.”

“Certainly.”
He inclined his head, still trying hard not to smile.

At that, she
threw her comb at him. He ducked, the quick movement sending a jolt
of pain through his shoulder as the comb went flying over his
head.

Apparently,
she wasn’t finished.

“To start, do
you want to explain last night?” She put one hand on jutted hip,
her eyes flashing.

“No,” he
responded.

“That’s not
going to do,” she fired back.

“It’s going to
have to,” he replied calmly, because it was the truth. He watched
as her eyes blazed. “Julia, there are some things you can’t
know.”

“
That’s
not good enough,” she retorted, walking toward him angrily. “In
case you don’t remember, even though I can’t imagine you forgetting
because I keep reminding you, but you’re also responsible for three
other human beings on this earth. Whatever you’re doing that puts
your life in danger has to stop. They’ve lost enough; I’m not going
to let them lose
you!
”

He watched her
eyes flare and she had ended her tirade by using one long, slim
finger to poke him painfully in the chest.

She needn’t
have used her physical exclamation point; he felt each word like a
blow. An odd feeling stole over him, a feeling that he vaguely
identified as guilt.

Julia
continued. “Furthermore, what if one of the children had happened
on you last night instead of me? I can imagine the years of therapy
that would ensue at having a gun pointed at one of them or seeing
their uncle bleeding and delirious.”

“I wasn’t
delirious,” he felt it important to point out, although this
conversation was beginning to be very uncomfortable, mainly because
she was right.

“
It
doesn’t matter! Whatever it is you do with your life now affects
the lives of three other people and you can add me to that list
because if something happened to you,
I
would be left with
your mother!
And if that, whatever it is, happens to bring danger into
this house, I have something to say about it and guns are frankly
unacceptable in a house where there are children.”